


Making a wedding too real

by Anarik



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Awesome Lydia, But Derek Marries Braeden, Don't say I didn't warn you, Established Braeden/Derek Hale, F/M, Happy Braeden, Happy Derek, I Just Had Bitter Feelings, Language?, Lydia Martin & Stiles Stilinski Friendship, Lydia is Perfect, M/M, Please Don't Hate Me, Sad, Sad Ending, Sad Stiles Stilinski, Scott McCall & Stiles Stilinski Friendship, Secret Crush, Stiles Stilinski in Love, Stiles is a good friend, Stiles-centric, Unrequited Love, Wedding Planning, Weddings, Why Did I Write This?, with derek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-17
Updated: 2017-10-17
Packaged: 2019-01-18 12:20:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12387969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anarik/pseuds/Anarik
Summary: Watching the person you're in love with getting married with someone else is as bittersweet as it sounds.





	Making a wedding too real

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language, I'm sorry if there's any mistake, if you could point that out for me, I'll edit the chapter. Thank you!
> 
> Teen Wolf does not belong to me.

The moment Derek announces he and Braeden are engaged, Stiles knows he should be happy. He really should. Maybe he and Derek isn’t the best of friends but you stop being strangers after one too many life-threatening/life-saving situations. Everyone is happy for them, of course. Braeden is such an amazing woman and Derek has healed from all the crap Kate’s existence brought. Derek is fine; hell, Stiles would dare to say that Derek is great, and Braeden did that, with patience and love. They’re happy. But Stiles can’t help but feel that he’s in a spotlight and everything turned black around him the moment Derek tells them the news. Nobody notices a change on him because he has been schooling himself for a while now on the art of lying and keeping it together until he’s alone. So, he takes a deep breath, puts his best smile on, congratulates Derek, tells him he deserves to be happy, Derek smiles at him happily and they hug. The pack celebrates until pretty late in the night and Stiles leaves first because he has to make it to the house before his father to make him something for dinner. Nobody questions him and nobody asks him anything. They don’t know.

***

When Stiles gets to the house that night, he looks around and his sight clouds with tears. He sobs before going to the kitchen and getting a lasagna out of the freezer. He throws it in the oven and almost runs to the bathroom. He’s crying and his breathing is erratic, he knows there could be a panic attack coming any time but he doesn’t really care. Derek is getting _married_. Derek is _moving on_. Soon there’ll be little wolves running around and the Hales will be a big family again. And Derek is doing all of that without _him_. And it’s not that Stiles hates Braeden for it, because he doesn’t. She’s done such a great job helping Derek, and listening to him, and loving him, and showing him what love really _is_ about. But Stiles can’t help but feel that _he_ could do that too. That if he was a little bit older, or if Derek was a little bit younger, they would have been _amazing_ together. And it hurts him thinking about the ‘what if’s but that’s the only thing he can do from now on. Because Derek is happy with someone else, and he should be sincerely happy for him. He _will_ be happy for him.

***

Derek chooses Scott to be his best man. That’s not really a surprise, and Scott is more than happy. The problem is that Stiles, being Scott’s best friend, is needed to come along with Scott because he needs a second option on whatever he decides. At first is cool. The first thing Derek and Braeden decide to do is cake tasting. Werewolves have a delicate paladar around synthetic things because they can taste the chemicals on the food, so Derek and Scott look for a cake for werewolves and Braeden and he look for a cake for humans. The cake tasting is fun, they try a lot of cakes and Stiles promises not to eat another cake until the wedding. Everyone laughs because they know he won’t be able to keep that promise. He loves cake just as much as he loves curly fries. Stiles questions himself if Braeden really didn’t notice those longing looks he gave Derek every time he had his back turned to him, and if she did notice them, he’s glad she didn’t say anything.

***

The first and only one to notice something’s wrong with him because of Derek’s wedding is Lydia. She’s always been observant and nothing happens without her knowing. She’s in charge of the decoration, and she makes him tag along with her to pick the flowers and to help her choose the colors, but he’s distracted most of the time and keeps staring at windows that have wedding dresses and tuxes, sighing and tuning out the world. He doesn’t even realize when they arrive at Lydia’s apartment. He sits on the couch and she goes to the kitchen to make some tea. That should have given him a clue of what was going to happen but he was internalizing his own feelings and didn’t want to think about the world around him.

“How long?” she asks. Voice quiet, almost a whisper, once she’s sitting beside him. Stiles snaps out of his mind and looks at her with a frown.

“How long what?” he asks, confused.

“How long have you been in love with Derek?” she asks, and he opens his eyes wide.

There’s no point in denying if Lydia figured it out. He sighs, looks at his hands and lets his shoulders fall in a sad way.

“I’m not really sure… I think I started to have feelings for him when the Alpha pack was around. But I didn’t realize until he almost dies, you know, the Berserkers incident,” he shrugs and Lydia blinks at him.

“Jesus, Stiles! It’s been seven years since the Berserkers!” she almost yells, eyes and mouth wide open. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“What for? He was already with Braeden when that happened, and he was happy. Look at him now, Lydia. He’s going to get married and I can’t even hate Braeden because she’s been great for him. I just want to see him happy, doesn’t matter if it’s not with me.”

“It does matter to you.” She says, frown deep on her face.

“Of course it does. I would give anything if it was _me_ the one who makes him happy, but that’s not the case and I don’t want to ruin that for him. I’ll move on, eventually.”

“You should tell him.”

“No.”

***

The moment Stiles sees the invitation come through the mail, he wants to tear it apart, and throw the paper on the trashcan piece by piece. He doesn’t do that, though. Scott is in his apartment, visiting with the new puppy he found in an alley, and that he decided to adopt. Stiles doesn’t want to say it out loud but the puppy reminds him of before-the-bite Scott.

They were talking about a new girl Scott met in the park because of puppy-Scott when the invitation comes through the mail. Stiles thanks the delivery man and puts it on the dinner table.

“Oh, you got yours already!?” Scott asks from the couch. “I’m still waiting for mine! And I’m supposed to be the best man!”

“Have you written your speech yet?” Stiles asks, trying to avoid the subject of the invitation.

“Shit! I haven’t! Derek’s gonna kill me if I don’t do them justice. I’m gonna go and start with that asap. Love you, dude!” Scott gathers his coat and keys and he’s out of the door in record time.

“Love you, too.”

Stiles sighs and walks to the dinner table and grabs the little invite. It’s electric blue, just like Derek’s wolf eyes, and the words are brown, like Braeden’s eyes.

“Lydia outdid herself this time…”                                   

He puts the invite down after catching the date. Only five more months and they’ll tie the knot. He feels himself tear a little bit but he stops himself from it and says out loud.

“I’m happy for Derek.”

***

Lydia informs him Braeden, Malia and she are going to go to find the perfect dress, and that he should come along. And by ‘should’ she meant, ‘I’m going to drag your ass out of bed if you’re not in my apartment by 7 a.m.’. He doesn’t want to go, she knows that, but she told him that he at least should talk to Braeden, give her the ‘Brother Speech’, even though he’s not really his brother, and he’s in love with him. But Stiles concedes she _does_ have a point. He’s only seen the relationship from outside, and even though he’s seen Derek happy throughout the years, he still doesn’t have the best of relationships with her. They see each other at pack meetings, yes, but it’s not like he has sat with her to eat ice cream and talk about boys. Maybe that’s what he needs, maybe he needs to reassure himself that Derek is going to be fine with Braeden. That she’s going to take care of him just like he would like to do, or maybe more, who knows? So, he tags along with the girls, and they go from store to store, looking for dresses that don’t make people look at Braeden’s scar and distract themselves from how beautiful she’s going to look.

When Malia and Lydia are off looking for dresses with the assistant’s help, Stiles and Braeden sit in uncomfortable silence waiting for them.

“Hey, Braeden…” he starts, while looking at some point in the white wall in front of him.

“Yes?”

“You know we all love Derek, right?”

“Of course, I do.” She answers, and Stiles can sense the frown on her voice.

He looks at her and she looks worried. Stiles has prepared the Big Speech about how she should never hurt Derek because he has lived through a lot of shit, before and after everything, and how he would kill her if she does something like that. But when he looks at her, worried and ready to lend her ear for whatever he has to say, he understands why Derek loves her.

“Thank you for loving him,” he ends up saying. “He’s been through so much and I’m really glad he found someone who can love him like you do. Please keep loving him, even if he ends up being difficult, because let’s be honest, he’s difficult as he is. Thank you for being patient with him and for helping him. I’m sure you’ll be very happy.” He finishes and Braeden is looking at him with a soft, watery smile.

Braeden stands up and sits on his lap, hugging him tightly and sobbing a little bit.

“Thanks, Stiles. It means a lot to me that you’ve said that. I know you’re really protective of your people. I’ll make sure he’s always loved.”

“You’re my people too, now.”

When Lydia and Malia come back with the dresses, they joke about how Stiles managed to ruin Braeden’s makeup in less than ten minutes and how they’re never going to make him come along. He knows it’s a lie, he’s sure he’ll be going with them for a lot of things, and Lydia will take him to buy his tux, and he’ll come to buy their dresses. When Braeden is in the changing room again, Lydia gives him an approval nod and a bright smile. ‘You did good’ she mouths and he shrugs. He feels a little bit light, sure, but he needs to go home and maybe cry watching romcoms where the couple always gets together at the end.

They chose a beautiful dress, sirene style, heart shaped top, filled with flowers from the top to the bottom, and a long wedding veil with the same flowers appliques the dress has. They all cry, the girls because Braeden looks beautiful and Stiles because _Braeden looks beautiful._

***

Lydia, as the person who’s organizing everything, wants it to be perfect. Wants it to be the best wedding Beacon Hills has ever _seen_ , past, present and future. And she wants everyone to know that it was _her_ who made it happen. Stiles comes along with her to find the band, to choose the place for the reception, to go to the church Derek’s parents got married a long time ago and ask if they still have the date reserved. Lydia checks every single spot in the church to make sure and imagine where she would be putting the floral arranges, and how the colors with look with the seats. After that she makes him tag with the couple and Scott to do the food tasting, and who says ‘no’ to free food? Stiles surely isn’t. They taste so much food that day that Stiles doesn’t eat dinner and breakfast the next day.

***

Stiles knows that Braeden will be coming in a limo. Malia will be the one holding her veil and Lydia will be checking that everything is perfect. Braeden indeed looks beautiful. The veil covers her scar so the attention is not directed at that, but it’s transparent enough that if look through it, hard and focusing, you can see that there is _indeed_ a scar there. Derek looks stunning too, handsome as ever and with a big, happy smile on his face, tears on his eyes as he looks at Braeden walking down the aisle.

Stiles takes pictures of everything. He promises Scott he’ll be printing them and giving everyone a copy. He doesn’t care that there’s a professional photographer doing that as well. He wants memories, damn it.

***

In the reception, after taking pictures with Derek and Braeden, with Lydia and Malia, with Scott, and one with the whole pack, Stiles is sitting on his assigned table, watching the newlyweds dance for the first time as husband and wife. After a moment, his dad and Melissa take the dance floor, and Scott and Malia join them. Huh. Interesting. Lydia comes to him, offering her hand.

“Stiles, get off your cute little ass and dance with me now.”

Stiles laughs remembering the disaster of the formal, so many years ago, and takes her hand. The song is slow, so Lydia puts her arms around Stiles neck and he wraps his arms around her waist.

“Are you ok?” she asks.

“Better than I thought I would.” He answers, murmuring on her shoulder. “He’s really happy, look at him,” and she does look at Derek, who’s tracing Braeden’s profile with his nose. “I can’t be sad and mad if he looks like that, you know?”

“So, you moved on?”

“No, I don’t think I’m ready to say that out loud yet. One step at a time.” He answers and she smiles at him.

“Good. Tell me when you feel like you moved on so I can introduce you to a guy that’s _dying_ to meet you. Like, seriously. He’s annoying. You two have that in common.”

“Maybe another day. But thanks, Lyds.” He laughs, denying with his head. “You’re awesome.”

“I know.”

The dance for a few more minutes until he spots Malia and Scott sitting on their table, talking really close.

“Do you think those two will figure it out?” Stiles asks and swings Lydia so she can have a look on the couple.

“Oh, my god. Don’t _even_ get me started.”


End file.
